When it comes to startups specializing in fintech, one immediately thinks of services for everyone that facilitate payments via smartphone or help build or manage investment portfolios. But fintech is not only that. After the first, necessary, wave of startups specializing in payments and investments for end users, now is the time for a second creative generation engaged in more sectoral fields and aimed at banking companies.
The six fintechs selected for the first Italian Visa Innovation Program Europe are an excellent litmus test to understand where fintech services are going. Visa’s initiative, created to promote digital innovation in Italian fintech in collaboration with Hackquarters and Talent Garden and launched in March, concludes the selection phase by announcing the finalist startups.
The strategic themes of this first Italian edition of the European Visa programme, “Building an intelligent and sustainable future”, “Implementing the development of SMEs”, “Experiencing new generation payment experiences”, “Unlocking new payment flows” and “Embedded Finance”, focused on what Banking companies are asking of fintech startups.
Launched in 2018, the European program has so far brought together 72 companies selected from over 900 applications in 7 countries. The Italian edition of Visa Innovation Program Europe has chosen CashDirector, Conio, Fairtile, INEO, Step 4 Business and VOICEME.
The six winners of the Visa Innovation Program Europe
CashDirector is a cloud-based digital assistant that helps SMEs streamline day-to-day financial and administrative tasks and manage cash flow. CashDirector is available to banks, credit institutes, payment institutions and all entities that intend to include it within their offer for companies.
Conio, on the other hand, is a provider of digital asset custody and management services with proprietary technology and a patented recovery system. The goal of Conio’s founders is to become the most trusted digital asset company for financial institutions and corporates, who will offer it to their retail and institutional clients.
Fairtile is a defined Credit Intelligence and Automation platform. Fairtile leverages Big Data, Human Science and AI to deliver real-time data-driven intelligence and a scalable level of automation. The goal is to overcome the complexities, costs and inadequacies of the current credit paradigm thanks to Artificial Intelligence.
INEO deals with digital and anti-fraud services focused on the so-called digital KYC (Know Your Customer) for real-time anti-fraud and anti-money laundering checks. Thanks to its patented technology and through a simple experience, Ineo provides services to support customer management, from identification to acquisition, on all company-customer touchpoints in less than a minute.
Furthermore, Step 4 Business is the first digital and global financial services challenger for SMEs. The service leverages the benefits of open banking (PSD2), open finance and technology to deliver a unique user experience to small and medium-sized businesses. Step is currently active in Italy as an Azimut Marketplace, but also in Spain and Brazil with already 13,000 registered SMEs.
Finally, VOICEME is a patented “Secure Customer Authentication” platform based on voice recognition and other 5 authentication factors that allows you to access digital properties, pay, sign documents, access restricted physical areas and confirm actions and identities using your voice.
Generate a smarter financial ecosystem
These six Visa program finalists will now have the opportunity to receive training and mentorship from industry experts to accelerate their solutions and expand internationally, supported by Visa’s global network in 200 countries.
Stefano Stoppani, Country Manager of Visa Italy commented: “We are very proud of the results of the 2023 edition of Visa Innovation Program Europe in Italy and to continue this unique collaborative initiative internationally. With this project, Visa wants to connect the fintech ecosystem, acting as an open network and providing them with the visibility, network and solutions necessary to support the development of their businesses”.
Ultimately, if the Italian edition of Visa Innovation Program Europe intended to promote and generate a smarter, more efficient and more sustainable ecosystem of financial transactions, focusing in particular on optimizing the processes of merchants and SMEs, it can be said that the goal has actually been achieved.
Content in partnership with Visa
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